


Fool in the Rain

by mintboy (orphan_account)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Library, Fluff, Humanstuck, Librarians, M/M, Meet-Cute, One Shot, POV First Person, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-08
Updated: 2018-11-08
Packaged: 2019-08-20 10:05:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16553732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/mintboy
Summary: Dave, a library assistant who happens to be incredibly bored during his shift, ticks off a really cute guy checking out a romance novel.For my boyfriend.





	Fool in the Rain

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KittyMotor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittyMotor/gifts).



‘Library Assistant’ was probably the last job-title I would’ve wanted as a kid, or even considered having as a teenager. I mean, sure, it’s a sort of in-between situation for me, but I can’t help but laugh a little at the thought of myself, ten-years-old and doodling at my kitchen table, dreaming of being famous. What a load of bullshit.

When I say in-between, I mean I’m still clinging onto those bullshit dreams, while working four part-time jobs in the area – library assistant, dog walker, event photographer, and pizza delivery guy. In the very little time I have outside of that, I try and work on my ‘hobbies’, or, rather, the actual careers I want to pursue, as best I can. It’s hard, though, and I find my interest in them slipping as I’m taken over with a sort of millennial exhaustion.

Speaking of exhaustion, I jump in my chair as my head lolls just a bit too far forward, throwing me out of my somewhat-pleasant state of semi-slumber. Sitting at the front desk of the library, I’m constantly faced with an inescapable boredom and a silence that eats at my core. I hate silence – the unoccupied quiet is deafening, and it makes my skin crawl. It always has. I’ve taken to bringing headphones to work with me, but my phone is dead, so I’m stuck absently tapping a beat on the counter, staring out at the mostly-empty library.

My shift is at an odd time, and by that, I mean that there’s no one remotely around my age here, ever. It’s just late enough that the early-risers who come in to do homework have left, but not quite late enough that anyone is out of school and stopping by. The patrons who stop by are always the elderly, who come and read magazines in the lounge in silence – boring. All boring. Always boring.

I push up my shades for a moment, rubbing at my eyes and suppressing a yawn. Blinking some of the fatigue out of my eyes, my vision slightly spotty, I trace a pattern on the counter with my finger. Absently, I pick off a little sliver of nail-polish that got on my cuticles. I’ve never been too good at painting my nails, but I like how they look painted – practice makes perfect, I guess.

I glance up, my eyes suddenly catching on someone who is definitely not over the age of fifty. In fact, someone who’s probably around my age – at least, I think so. I can only see him from behind. He’s browsing the “New Arrivals” shelf, which is relatively small; being a local library, our selection is much less extensive than the county library. He’s wearing a flannel and black jeans – which is what gave away his age.

I watch him for just a moment, having nothing else to do, before I redirect my attention to grabbing the bottle of apple-juice I have stashed underneath the counter and taking a swig. It’s a full-sized, two-litre bottle; I couldn’t find anything smaller at the gas-station convenience store by my apartment. I tuck it back underneath the counter, wiping off my lips onto my hand, and reach over to grab a couple pens from the mug beside the computer. I tap out a stupidly sick beat with them, bobbing my head along. This goes on for a few more minutes, before I hear a sort of annoyed cough from a few feet away. I look up, ceasing my little jam-session.

It’s the younger guy who was looking in the New Arrivals, and it appears he is, in fact, just about my age. He’s got a look of annoyance plastered on his face, and his arms crossed, despite the fact he’s holding a chapter-book in his right hand. He’s attractive – I’ll give him that. Despite the clear frown, his features are pleasant and handsome. His hair is messy, but in a charming way, and it falls onto his ears in such a way that it just covers the tops of them under a little heap of curls. He’s got wooden plugs in his ears, and as his lips twitch in displeasure, his two labrets – snakebites – move with them. One of his sleeves is pulled back slightly, from the crossing of his arms, and I can see just the edges of a black-work tattoo.

“What’s up?” I ask, tapping my fingers on the counter.

“I’d _like_ to check out a book,” he practically snarls at me, and, okay, woah, his voice is really hot.

“Cool your jets, my guy,” I respond, reaching out, as if to say, ‘then hand me the book’, before continuing, “get up on the wrong side of the bed today or somethin’?”

He shoots me a glare like a dagger, begrudgingly shoving the book into my hand. I take a look at it; to be honest, it’s not what I expected him to be reading. It’s a new romance novel release. I click my tongue, examining the back for a moment.

“Look, I know you probably have nothing better to do, but I’d appreciate if you could just let me check this fucking book out without giving me your two-cents on the romance genre,” he snaps at me. I look back from the book to him, shrugging.

“Wasn’t gonna say anything,” I reply, “I do need your library card, though, dude.”

He bristles a little, and I see a little color rush to his cheeks. It’s cute.

“Right,” he says, digging in his pocket and fishing out his wallet. It takes him a moment to find the card, and it’s slightly bent. He hands it to me before crossing his arms again, and I scan it.

His name pops up on the screen. _Karkat Vantas_. I make a mental note of it. I scan the book and swipe it over the magnet, before putting it down on the counter and pushing it towards him.

“You’ve got three weeks with this,” I say, and since I know it’ll irk him, I continue, “so I’ll see you again before then, huh? A second date. Ooh-la-la.”

He scowls, grabbing the book in a quick, angry swipe.

“Yeah right,” is his only reply, before he storms out of the library.

The rest of the day is uneventful, and my mind keeps circling back to that pissed-off guy who borrowed the romance book. Kar … Karkat. Yeah, that was his name. Karkat. I occupy the remainder of my shift – and the pizza-delivery shift afterwards – thinking about what I’d say if I saw him again. My mind keeps circling back to him; his handsome face, the hilarity of ticking him off.

A week passes, and I don’t see him again. It’s a little sad, but I don’t know what I was expecting. After all, it’s not like people frequent the library if they’re just reading for leisure. I find myself glancing at the door every time someone wanders inside, hoping it’ll be him.

Then, my dreams suddenly come true, as if some gay fairy-godfather waved his magic wand and granted my wish of seeing a hot guy one more time, instead of giving me a better income or, like, less than three minimum-wage jobs. A week and four days after he borrowed his first book, Karkat wanders back in during one of my shifts. He drops the book into the drop off, and I perk up a little, looking over the counter at him. Immediately, he makes his way back over to the New Arrivals book-case, leafing through the romance novels. I know they’re the romance ones, because I stock that shelf – and also because, I guess, I could probably predict he’d check out another romance novel.

Once he seems to find one he likes, he comes up to the counter, stopping for a moment as if to plea internally that another librarian would come out and check out his book for him. I offer him a little up-turn of my lip, a closed-mouth smirk, raising an eyebrow.

“Shy all of a sudden?” I say, after a moment, pressing a hand to my chest in feigned offense, “I thought we had something, Karkles, I’ve waited oh-so-patiently for our second date. I thought you’d stood me up, and I’d have to stand here in the rain, Led-Zeppelin-style, wondering where I went wrong –”

“One, my name is _Karkat_ , shithead, and two, ‘Fool in the Rain’ isn’t about being stood up, it’s about an _idiot_ waiting on the wrong block,” Karkat finally steps forward, dropping his book and library card onto the counter.

“Romance music connoisseur as well, I see?” I say, a little laugh stashed behind my voice.

“I have _good taste_ ,” he retorts, “unlike someone,” he glances at my t-shirt, and I tug at it, looking down.

“What’s wrong with _The Room_? It’s a cult classic, my guy,” I reach over, picking up and scanning his library card, “I have matching underwear.”

“TMI,” Karkat makes a face of disgust.

I let out a real laugh, now – a sort of breathy one – as I scan his book and demagnetize it. I hand it to him.

“Until next time, Kit-Kat.”

For the following weeks, we sort of fall into a regular cycle of events; he’ll come by once a week to check out a new romance novel, and we’ll have some fun banter. As time passes, he begins to actually enjoy it, too, it seems; he laughs along with me, and we actually talk about our lives and do more than make snarky quips at one another.

After six weeks of this, though, he doesn’t come in alone. When he goes up to the New Arrivals, another man follows him – tall, attractive, dressed nice. It makes my skin bristle a little bit, and I feel a little sick. After seeing Karkat so much, it was really, really hard to not take a genuine fancy to him; beyond just thinking he’s attractive. I had thought he was single.

When he finds a book, the other guy runs a hand over his shoulder, saying something, and then walks out of the library, keys in hand. Karkat wanders over to the front desk, handing me the book and his library card. I scan the card wordlessly, picking up the book.

“What, no annoying greeting?” he scoffs, “Where did Dave go? I can’t seem to hear a mind-meltingly irritating commentary on my life.”

I can only find the energy to shrug.

“Not feeling it today, dude, sorry,” is all I say, scanning the book, “who’s that guy you were talking to? Haven’t seen him around here before.”

Karkat blinks, his brow furrowing a little, but ignores my somewhat melancholy town, just moving to answer to the question.

“He’s from the next town over, I met him a couple days ago. We’re going out tonight,” he explains, and I nod.

“Have fun,” is all I say, and as he leaves, the gives me a worried glance, but says nothing else. After he’s out of sight, I slump down in the chair behind me, rubbing my eyes under my shades. I thought I may’ve had something there, but I guess I was wrong – fuck, I should’ve asked him out, or something. Groaning, I mull over the time we’ve spent together in my head; it was never much, but it meant a lot to me. It made the days easier, gave me something to look forward to.

Pushing my shades back into place, I glance over at the New Arrivals, an idea forming in my head. It’s a little speck of light, amongst the churning disappointment, and I latch onto it, forcing it to grow. Romantics like grand gestures, don’t they? This was just Karkat’s first date with this guy – maybe, next week, I’ll have a chance. I just have to think big; and this idea could just be grand enough.

When my shift ended, instead of leaving the library, I set off into the stock room, my fingers itching to pull my plan into action.

Karkat returns the next week, alone, and drops his book in the drop off. I watch from my post behind the counter, bouncing my legs with anticipation as he heads towards the New Arrivals. This is it.

He picks up one of the new romance novels, and I hold my breath a little as he opens the front cover. He turns slightly, looking around himself, his brow furrowed, and pulls out a little slip of paper. I know exactly what it says, because I wrote it.

Under a “Dear Karkat,” It’s the first two lines of a poem:

“ _Love peruse me, seeke, and finde_

_How each corner of my minde_ ”

And, scribbled at the end, are just the words, “browse your history.”

A challenge. I rub my hand over my mouth, trying not to look at him – to give myself away. He rubs the back of his neck, collecting the little paper, and walks further into the library, presumably – well, hopefully – to our romance section.

You see, in every single one of the books he’s checked out from me, is another excerpt of that poem. And, in the very first novel, the one that let me meet him for the first time, it instructs him to check out the book the poem is from. He’d need to do a little digging, but nothing too terrible. I just hope to whatever gods are out there that he wants to solve the puzzle.

An hour passes before he emerges, and I find myself holding my breath. He’s holding a little book tightly in both hands as he marches up to the front desk. He puts it down without saying a word, glancing around, as if looking for something – or someone, perhaps – that is missing.

“Hey, Karkles,” I say, casually, “I see you found the book.”

I run my fingers over the worn, cream cover. It’s the one I was leading him to – _Poems of Lady Mary Wroth_.

His eyes widen.

“Wait, you –”

I raise a finger, requesting his silence, and he stops, the dark blush on his cheeks deepening.

“You solved my puzzle, yeah,” I admit, biting my lip for a moment as nerves wrack me, “you just … seeing you here is really nice, and it’s, like, my favorite part of every week. And I know we’re both really busy, and you lowkey hate my guts, but … I was wondering if you might want to go out with me sometime.”

He’s tense, a look of absolute disbelief on his face, and he swallows, looking down.

“You don’t have to say yes,” I clarify, suddenly, “I just – I really like you a lot, and I know you like these romance books, so I wanted to try something, that, like,”

“Yes, Dave,” he answers, cutting me off.

“What?”

“Yes!” his exclamation is punctuated with a little laugh, “I’ll go out with you. Shut the fuck up and get over here, you absolute idiot.”

Steadying myself with a hand, I jump over the counter. He wraps his arms around me, pulling me into a tight hug.

“You’re so fucking stupid,” he murmurs against my chest, and I hold him tighter, taking him in. He’s warm, and he smells nice, and god, it’s like heaven to hug him.

When we finally pull away, we both laugh, a little, and I feel breathless.

“Where? When?” I ask, grinning.

“I’m free tonight,” he shrugs, “are you?”

“Yeah, yeah, I am,” I answer, taking his hands in my own and squeezing them tightly, “how does Thai sound?”

“Amazing,” he answers, smiling back at me, and my heart soars a little. He leans up, pecking me on the lips, “my fool in the rain.”

**Author's Note:**

> "Fool in the Rain" is a cute song I used to love as a kid. 10/10 would recommend.
> 
>  [This is a link to the full poem Dave used in the books.](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/53574/from-the-countesse-of-montgomerys-urania-love-peruse-me-seeke-and-finde)


End file.
